SSF248 – Growth in Holiness: Doctors of the Interior Life

Course Overview

Sir, we would see Jesus . . . This was the urgent request from the Greeks in John’s gospel who had met and listened to Jesus’ disciples. And it has also been, essentially, the same ultimate desire of the saints and Doctors of the church who wished nothing more — or less — than to see Our Lord and be transformed by a growth in holiness and purity of heart, knowing that it is the pure in heart who shall see God. In this class we will explore the fruits and lessons of this grand desire in the lives and writings of these saints and Doctors of the Church and their pursuit of God. We will look for guidance in our own pursuit of holiness, to saints from both the east and the west. Saints such as Gregory the Great, St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Thérèse de Lisieux (The Little Flower), St. Bernard of Clairvaux, St. Maximus the Confessor and St. Isaac the Syrian. The great Doctors of the Church enjoyed and explored their own unique paths toward holiness and knowing God, originating from different vantage points, but all conforming, as it has been said, to “that great riverbed of Scripture and Tradition.” Our goal will be to learn from them as we, too, conforming to that great “riverbed of Scripture and Tradition,” seek to grow in personal holiness, so that we might better — as did the Greeks described in John’s gospel — seek to be worthy of seeing our Lord and walking with Him into a partaking of the divine nature and fellowship with the Holy Trinity.